Pop icon Janet Jackson recently said in an interview with The Guardian that she had heard claims suggesting Democratic presidential candidate and vice president Kamala Harris is “not Black.”
Jackson’s comment supports a narrative associated with former president Donald Trump who had earlier questioned Harris’ Black heritage.
“She’s not Black. That’s what I heard — that she’s Indian” Jackson said in the interview.
“That’s what I was told.I mean, I haven’t watched the news in a few days. I was told they discovered her father was white,” the singer added. However, the interviewer promptly corrected her statement explaining that Harris has both Indian and Black heritage.
When asked if the US is ready for a woman of color as vice president, Jackson responded, “Honestly, I don’t want to answer that because I really, truthfully, don’t know. I think either way it goes, there’s going to be mayhem.”
Kamala Harris has consistently identified herself as Black and made history as the first Black and Asian American woman to serve as vice president.
Harris’ father, Donald J Harris, is a Jamaican economist, and her mother, Shyamala Gopalan, was a biomedical scientist from India.
Earlier, Republican presidential candidate Trump had questioned Harris’s Black heritage during a July conference of Black journalists, claiming Harris primarily identified with her Indian heritage in the past.

“I did not know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black, and now she wants to be known as Black,” Trump said.
He added, “I respect either one, but she obviously doesn’t, because she was Indian all the way, and then all of a sudden, she became Black.”